فصل 12

CHAPTER TWELVE

The secret computer

Somewhere the key to Ashton’s death lay in Benson’s life, and I decided to investigate everything about Howard Benson. Ogilvie had told me that there was no information in the computer about Benson, but I remembered putting all the Ashton names - and Benson’s - through the computer right at the beginning. Benson’s records had been there then, but locked away in Level Purple. What had happened to them? Had somebody taken Benson’s records out of the computer? It was a puzzle I couldn’t solve, so I went to the War Office to see if I could look at Benson’s army records from thirty years before. All I knew was that Benson had been a soldier during the war, but I had no idea when he had left the army. It took several hours of searching through long lists of names and numbers before I discovered, to my total amazement, that Ashton and Benson had left the British army on exactly the same day, 4th January 1947. I knew from the computer that ‘George Ashton’ was not a real British soldier, but a Russian scientist in disguise. The coincidence was too great. So, if it wasn’t a coincidence, it must have been planned. But who had planned it? Was Benson another Russian? What reason could there be to explain why he had left the army on the same day as George Ashton, and then worked for and lived with Ashton for more than thirty years?

I took Benson’s army file home and read it very carefully. Everything seemed normal, exactly as Ogilvie had found when he had investigated Benson. Then I suddenly noticed one strange point. When Benson’s departure from the army was first mentioned, an officer had written, ‘Proposed leaving date - 21st March 1947’, but Benson had actually left on 4th January, 1947. Was the difference important?

The health of every soldier is carefully watched and recorded and I looked at Benson’s medical record in the army. Early in November 1946 he had complained that he had pains in his left arm. In December the doctor had asked for a special examination of Benson’s heart. And three weeks later, in January 1947, Benson had left the army!

I telephoned a friend of mine who was a doctor, if a man in his early thirties complains of a pain in his left arm for three months, what could be wrong with him?’ I asked.

‘That depends,’ he replied, ‘it could be one of several things. If it’s a friend of yours, tell him to go to a doctor at once.’

‘Why? Is it so serious?’

‘It could be a kind of heart disease,’ he replied.

‘Is that bad?’ I asked. ‘Would the man survive?’

‘That depends again,’ said the doctor, is he fit? Does he smoke?’

I remembered that Benson had had a desk job in the army. ‘Let’s suppose that he’s not fit, and that he smokes.’

‘Then he could drop dead at any time, if he doesn’t get the right treatment immediately. Malcolm, is this someone I know?’

‘No,’ I replied. ‘There was a man in that condition in 1946. He died a few weeks ago, thirty years later. What do you think of that?’

‘I’m very surprised. Most people with that condition would have died long ago.’

The next person I spoke to was Benson’s last doctor in Marlow. He was not keen to tell me about Benson’s health, but I asked him when Benson had last had a heart attack.

He laughed and said, ‘I can certainly tell you about that. There was absolutely nothing wrong with Benson’s heart; it was in excellent condition.’

I thanked him and rang off. It was now fairly clear to me what had happened. The real Benson had suffered from a bad heart and had died after 18th December 1946, and before 4th January 1947. Somehow a new healthy Benson had taken his place, had left the army on 4th January, and had then remained very close to George Ashton until the day, thirty years later, when he had killed him. I had learned something, but I still did not know why Benson had killed George Ashton.

It was time for Penny and Gillian to leave for America. They had decided to sell the house at Marlow and the auction was going to be held while they were away. Gillian expected to be in America for quite a long time, but Penny hoped to be back after a week or two. She was then supposed to go back to visit the laboratory in Scotland.

It was about this time that I began to feel that somebody had given me quite a lot of valuable information, but I had failed to recognize its full importance. What was it? I thought about it for hours, but the right piece of information refused to come to the surface of my mind. Something I had heard, or maybe something I had read, was the key to the problem, but I could not find out what it was, no matter how much I tried.

On the day of the auction I went to the Ashtons’ house near Marlow. To my surprise Michaelis was there, looking as unhappy as I felt.

‘I’m glad Gillian isn’t here to see this,’ he remarked, as we looked around the rooms full of articles for sale. ‘It’s all so sad to see everything being sold off like this, but the model railway interests me. I thought I’d like to buy a bit of it, but I don’t think I’ll have a chance. Lucas Hartman is here.’

‘Who’s he?’ I asked.

‘A rich American who collects model railways. He’ll buy the whole thing, I expect. It’ll probably cost him $15,000, maybe more, but he’ll buy it.’

‘So much? Over $15,000 for a model railway? I don’t believe it,’ I said.

‘Wait and see,’ replied Michaelis. ‘And what annoys me is that I never got to understand the system. Ashton’s timetables didn’t fit. You remember I showed you his big books of railway timetables - the old London, Midland and Scottish Railway?’

‘Yes, I remember. You were going to compare them with the original ones. Weren’t they the same?’

‘No, they’re completely different. The pattern of Ashton’s timetables doesn’t seem to be like any normal system of railway timetabling. I just couldn’t understand it.’

As Michaelis was talking, I had a picture in my mind of George Ashton as he lay dying in the snow, trying to give me a Swedish railway timetable. It was as if a bomb exploded in my head.

By God, that’s it,’ I whispered. That’s got to be it!’

Michaelis stared at me. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Come on,’ I said. ‘We’ve got to speak to the auctioneer.’

Five minutes later we were talking to the man in charge of the auction.

‘I’m speaking for the Ashton sisters, Penelope and Gillian. You mustn’t sell the model railway upstairs.’

‘I’m not so sure I can do that,’ said the auctioneer. ‘You say you speak for the Ashton sisters. Can you prove it?’

‘No, I can’t, at the moment.’

‘I’m sorry, Mr Jaggard,’ he said, ‘I was engaged by Miss Penelope Ashton to sell the contents of this house. I can t stop that without a letter from her.’

‘But she’s in the United States,’ I almost shouted.

‘Then there’s nothing to be done,’ he said. The sale must go ahead.’

I tried ringing Ogilvie, Penny’s lawyer, even Penny herself in America, but I could find none of them. Finally I rang my bank manager.

‘What can I do for you, Mr Jaggard?’ he asked.

‘Later this afternoon I’m going to write a fairly large cheque - more than I have in my bank account at the moment. I want to borrow enough money to cover a cheque for $20,000, or even $25,000, for a month. Can I do that?’

‘Yes, I don’t see any difficulty, Mr Jaggard. We’ll cover your cheque. I hope you know what you’re doing. In any case, come and see me tomorrow about it. I’ll need your signature on some papers.’

I put the phone down. Michaelis was looking at me as if he thought I had suddenly gone mad.

‘Listen,’ I said. ‘I think we’ve found Ashton’s secret hiding place. I think that model railway is a computer - a sort of mechanical computer. You couldn’t understand Ashton’s railway timetables; you said they didn’t fit the original ones. Well, I don’t think they’re timetables at all. They’re computer programs, and that’s where Ashton had been hiding all his original thinking. That’s what he was trying to tell me when he gave me that Swedish railway timetable just before he died.’

Michaelis shook his head. ‘It’s a crazy idea,’ he said slowly, ‘but I suppose you might be right.’

‘I hope to God I am right,’ I said. ‘I’m taking a big risk - a very expensive risk!’

We went back to the room where everything was being sold. The auctioneer was just starting to sell the railway.

‘Ladies and Gentlemen, this is a unique model railway, with the most modern control equipment. It is one of the finest examples of model railways that we have ever seen. How much will you offer me for it?’

The offers started at $8,000 and went up slowly to $15,000. Hartman had said nothing, but suddenly he offered $16,000. I held up a finger, and the auctioneer said, ‘I have seventeen thousand pounds. Will anyone offer me more than seventeen thousand pounds?’

Hartman raised his finger to offer $18,000.

The only two people crazy enough to spend so much money for a model railway were Hartman and myself. The price went up and up. Finally I won, Hartman stopped, and the auctioneer called out, ‘Sold to Mr Jaggard for $31,000!’

Just as I was talking to the auctioneer, Michaelis called me to the telephone. It was Ogilvie.

I told him what I had done. I told him that the department now owed me $31,000 for a model railway I do not wish to write down the words that he used to describe me.